Family Day

Monday was a holiday - "Family Day".

Of all the holidays in all the world, I'm betting "Family Day" is the most boring-sounding, vanilla,  yawn-inducing holiday this side of Arbour Day. You don't get the spookiness of Halloween, the excitement of New Year's or even the romance of Valentine's. There is family. And it's on a day.

But hey, it's time off work and that's fine with me!

My brother J and his young family, E and L, came up for the weekend. The last time they came up at this time of year was 3 long years ago. Compare this:

We were supposed to be doing our "sad" faces. Margot was ...almost sad

To this:

Margot is definitely not the little toddler she was back then. No sir, she's a wisened 6-year old who has some of the makings of a great babysitter. She really took care of her little cousin, L.

The speed of the person walking is inversely proportional to their height

It was pretty cute to observe. This being the last weekend of Winterlude, we did lots of touristy family folksy stuff of course, like see ice sculptures...

and go for a winter walk.

Responsible AND efficient parenting

All in all, we had some nice days. And they were full of family.  Mission accomplished!

Carben Food + Drink

It's Valentine's Day today. Hooray!

[silence]

[crickets chirping]

OK so maybe I'm not a Valentine's Day booster -but I'm not a hater either. I'm more indifferent really. But this past Saturday, Glosette Girl and I decided to get into the spirit and went out for a "Valentine's Day" dinner a few days early. The place: Carben Food + Drink.

If there is a restaurant that best showcases the potential of this neighbourhood it's this one. It's urban yet understated. Original yet unpretentious.

Glosette Girl and I first went there a couple of years ago and had a really enjoyable experience. We were a bit hesitant to book again as we've re-visited restaurants in the past that we thought we loved and been less than thrilled during the encore. But this time, the repeat performance didn't disappoint.

First, the appetizer: wood ear mushrooms. Think baby bok choy, eryngii, miso glaze, turmeric aioli, edamame, and shiso. I didn't even know some of those were real words before coming here. But in a word: sumptuous! 

The mushrooms did not last long on our plate

Second, the mains. Glosette Girl went for the Atlantic Salmon with cauliflower puree, rapini, coconut squash puree, squid ink quinoa, pickled mustard seed, chili lime chinese okra and crispy curry leaf. I felt like exploring the vegetarian option and tried the brown butter and chive arancini, including the celeriac puree, almond gremolata, confit cipollini, compressed tomatoes and apple cider gastrique.  Is your stomach grumbling yet? No? Go back to your peanut butter and soda crackers.

The surprisingly filling arancini

We finished it all off by sharing the "Winter Wonderland" - a combination of walnut joconde, nougat mousse, sweet apple cider gel, confit saffron apples, white chocolate almond crumble and peppermint Meringue. Mmm..... decadent.

Dessert with Simon's maple whiskey digestif in the background

It's a fairly expensive restaurant but it makes for a nice splurge. From the attentive yet not pushy service to our water glasses never being empty, Carben hit the right notes. It doesn't hurt that it's literally down the street from our house either, which had a nice bonus: both Glosette Girl and I could enjoy a drink!

p.s. Glosette Girl here: the ceramic plates were made exclusively for the restaurant by a local neighbourhood pottery studio.

Les Cousins!

There's a cute part in the children's book Émilie et le petit sapin where Émilie's cousins appear and all the problems with the petit sapin are solved. Ahhh cousins. Is there anything they can't do?

My cousins live very far away, in England. The one time I visited them as a kid I remember being in awe of all their Judge Dredd comic books and expertise in playing Gauntlet II.

(Tangent - I just learned that Gauntlet II has no ending. Damn Original Nintendo and its unbeatable games).

Margot is very fortunate to have two cousins, N and M, just 20 minutes away. N is eight years old while M is three. We invited them over on Saturday evening for some healthy* Chinese food and a play date.

The Cyprus Garden special!

They are a rascally bunch together and as soon as N and M's parents dropped them off there was a general sense of gentle bedlam in the house.  By this I mean, M occasionally broke out singing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, while Margot and N engaged in intense and heated negotiations playing Pokemon cards.

(Tangent #2 - do you "play" Pokemon cards? From what I've seen, "playing" involves: (1) organizing cards on the floor; (2) reading the various powers of creatures on the cards [or, in Margot's case, asking N to as Margot can't read in English yet]; and (3) occasionally trading a card so you can repeat steps 1 and 2.)

Margot is an emotional soul, of course, so the evening involved the requisite crying. Fortunately N, who has quite a lot of Margot-wisdom at his ripe old age, was able to calm her down by giving her one of his Pokemon Cards. She was very grateful.

All-in-all I think the evening was a roaring success. Games played? Check. Socialization? Check. Tired kids ready for bed? Check and smiles (from the parents).

*might be slight exaggeration

Three Markets to Rule them All

Certain places give you a good idea of the the character of a neighbourhood: schools; restaurants; libraries (or the absence of libraries). Funnily enough, around here, it's the grocery stores that really tell the story. The grittier grocery stores stick to the grittier neighbourhoods, while the posher ones stick to the gentrified ones.

The proof is in the branding.

Let's start with my neighbourhood, Hintonburg - the roughest 'hood of the western Ottawa triumvirate of Wellington West, Hintonburg and Westboro. So what grocery store blesses my corner of town? Giant Tiger.

Having grown up in the suburbs, I had never even heard of Giant Tiger until I moved to Ottawa, which is a much larger and more diverse urban area than where I'm from. Most store locations seem to be in urban or poorer areas. The stuff here is cheap, like really cheap. It's not bad quality (although I wouldn't buy fresh produce here*) but they seem to put very little effort into making the store look nice and make up for it by making stuff available for less (or perhaps it's the reverse). The clientele of my Giant Tiger reflects the changing demographic of the neighbourhood: think hipsters, retirees and blue collar workers.

A few blocks west, in the gentrified neighbourhood of Wellington West, you find a.... Metro.

Metro stores generally look nice inside and this one is no exception. I think it's going for a modern-green-grocer-feel. The store isn't too big and has a decent variety of healthy food albeit at generally higher prices. I think the look is the key though. I suspect the urban professionals who live in this part of town consciously or subconsciously feel better when they shop here over the bigger box stores. Good job guys :)

Even further west is a Loblaws Superstore.

Ahhh Loblaws. If you visit eastern Canada you'll find one of these massive behemoths in almost every major suburb. They sell everything from organic food to mittens** and over-the-counter drugs. This is what I grew up with. So how did one sneak into Westboro, which is within Ottawa's greenbelt? Probably because Westboro is a sortof quasi-urban Ottawa neighbourhood. Yes there is some character here but the lots and houses here are generally bigger than Wellington West and Hintonburg and because of that you can't quite get away from car culture (and the car culture grocery store).

So that's it. A tale of three grocery stores! If you're wondering which one I shop at the answer is...all of them! What does that say about me? Hmmmmm......

* except lemons, says Jen
** and belts, says Jen